Have you joined The Brown Bookshelf Myspace forum yet?

We know, we know - you’re already a member of a million and one other forums, message boards and blog subscriptions. But one more won’t kill you.  Especially since, starting next month the forum will host some great guests for our Summer Chat Series.

June
Temperature Check - State of the Kiddie Lit industry. Need we say more?

July
Indies & The Author - It’s competitive out there. Even the big chains are having trouble. So how can authors and independent bookstores keep one another afloat? Come talk to reps from two indies that do it well.

August
Hype, Hype Hooray - Sure, authors, agents, publishers and librarians think we know what teen readers want…but do we really? Hear it right from the mouth of young readers.

Tentative Guests:

Jen Carlson of Dunow, Carlson, Lerner

Regina Brooks of Serendipity Literary Agency

Representative from Hue-Man Bookstore, Harlem, NY

Jenn Laughren of Books Inc and Not Your Mother’s Bookclub

But you have to join the Brown Bookshelf forum to get up close and personal with our guests.  And because we’re all book lovers, there will be a chance to win some.

Dates and times are still being nailed down, so it’s not too early to sign up and get your front-row seat for these great chats.

See you there!

Christian fiction is not a new phenomenon.  I grew up reading Catherine Marshall and Janette Oke’s Love Comes Softly series in the 80s.  In the 90s, the Left Behind series gained widespread notoriety on the literary scene.

Within African American Christian fiction, there are several well known authors including Jacquelin Thomas, Kendra Norman Bellamy, Michelle Andrea Bowen, Vanessa Davis Griggs, and Reshonda Tate Billingsley.

If we dig a bit deeper into the genre of Christian fiction, we find a subgenre known as  YA Christian fiction being written by authors including Jacquelin Thomas (The Divine Series), Reshonda Tate Billingsley (The Good Girlz Series), and Stephanie Perry Moore (Payton Skky Series).

Of the three authors, Stephanie Perry Moore has written the majority of her books for children and teens.  Visit her website and you will see what I mean.  Don’t forget to check out her 28 Days Later spotlight as well.   Stephanie is akin to a YA Christian fiction Meg Cabot with the number of series under her belt - Payton Skky, Perry Skky, Jr., Laurel Shadrach, Faith Thomas, Carmen Browne - and the list of series continue to grow. 

Christian Fiction author Victoria Christopher Murray joins the ranks of fellow adult authors Jacquelin Thomas and Reshonda Tate Billingsley as she introduces a series written for young adult readers.  Known for titles including Joy, Temptation, and Grown Folks Business, Murray has enlarged her writing territory to include teens with a four book series.  The Divine Divas Teen Series debuted in March 2008 with Diamond and will follow with India, Veronique, and Aaliyah. 

The series centers around four young ladies who have been best friends since they were toddlers.  The four friends formed a singing group to compete in a talent show in their hometown of Los Angeles.  Diamond is the self-proclaimed leader of the group who loves to sing and convinced her friends to form the group.  While she hopes to create her own fashion line, BFF India wants to create her own line of jewelry.  Sophomore class president Veronique also loves to sing, but is very politically aware and is driven to keeping her friends and classmates aware of the issues that impact them all.  Rounding out the talented, diverse foursome is Aaliyah who is in the group because she supports her friends in all of their endeavors, but her biggest aspiration in life is to attend MIT to become a nuclear physicist. 

Visit The Divine Divas site to read an excerpt of the first chapter of Diamond and visit The Divine Divas on Myspace. 

For the older young adult readers, self-published author Fon James emerged last year with her debut title Back and Forth.  Set on the campus of Jackson State University in Mississippi, four college seniors who are all in the school’s marching band juggle college life as well as what happens when sex and alcohol enter the equation.  Join Faith, Remi, Gavin, and Chrissy as they work through a situation that threatens their foursome.

The element of faith within fiction exists today for children of all ages.  These are five authors who you can check out and pass along to the young adults in your life. 

Every year, the American Library Association compiles a list of the Best Books for Young Adults (BBYA). Each month, the BBYA committee, made up of members of the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) updates the consideration list. As of April 3, 2008, two novels by African-American authors have made the consideration list: Conception (St. Martin’s, 2008) by Kalisha Buckhanon and After Tupac and D Foster (G.P. Putnam’s Son, 200 by Jacqueline Woodson.

Conception by Kalisha Buckhanon

About the book: Buckanan takes us to Chicago, 1992, and into the life of fifteen-year-old Shivana Montgomery, who believes all Black women wind up the same: single and raising children alone, like her mother.  Until the sudden visit of her beautiful and free-spirited Aunt Jewel, Shivana spends her days desperately struggling to understand life and the growing pains of her environment. When she accidentally becomes pregnant by an older man and must decide what to do, she begins a journey towards adulthood with only a mysterious voice inside to guide her. When she falls in love with Rasul, a teenager with problems of his own, together they fight to rise above their circumstances and move toward a more positive future.  Through the voice of the unborn child and a narrative sweeping from slavery onward, Buckhanon narrates Shivana’s connection to a past history of Black women who found themselves at the mercy of tragic circumstances.  All of their fates intertwine towards a shocking conclusion.

After Tupac and D Foster by Jacqueline Woodson

About the book: The day D Foster enters Neeka and her best friend’s lives, the world opens up for them. D comes from a world vastly different from their safe Queens neighborhood, and through her, the girls see another side of life that includes loss, foster families and an amount of freedom that makes the girls envious. Although all of them are crazy about Tupac Shakur’s rap music, D is the one who truly understands the place where he’s coming from, and through knowing D, Tupac’s lyrics become more personal for all of them.  

The girls are thirteen when D’s mom swoops in to reclaim D—and as magically as she appeared, she now disappears from their lives. Tupac is gone, too, after another shooting; this time fatal. As the narrator looks back, she sees lives suspended in time, and realizes that even all-too-brief connections can touch deeply.

Be sure to check out all the titles on the consideration list.

“Moved by the lack of children’s books and literacy in his native Ethiopia, Yohannes Gebregeorgis established Ethiopia Reads, bringing free public libraries and literacy programs to thousands of Ethiopian children.” Meet this weeks CNN hero, here.

The release of new books is an exciting day for book lovers all over especially when it’s a book by an author that you love.  With the news that the number of books by African American authors was down in 2007 compared to 2008, it is with pleasure that I present to you a list of young adult titles published from March to May.

March 1
Keeping Secrets (Kimani TRU) by Kendra Lee
16 Isn’t Always Sweet (Kimani TRU) by Cassandra Carter

March 18
Diamond (The Divas) by Victoria Christopher Murray

 
March 25
Lady J (Drama High) by L. Divine

April 1
She Said, She Said (Kimani Tru) by Celeste O. Norfleet and Jennifer Norfleet
 
April 29
Just Be by Carla Sarratt

May 1
Sunrise Over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers
If I Were Your Boyfriend (Kimani TRU) by Earl Sewell
 

May 6
Sixteen Candles by Tia Williams
 

For a thorough list of YA titles and authors, please visit our Brown Bookshelf Library.  We’ll update it throughout the year as we keep everyone in the know about the books available for young adult readers.  Stay tuned!

How do you excite, influence, and stir the souls of our children to greatness? In other words, how do you inspire our children to read?

Create a sense of self-efficacy: I have never known anyone to do anything unless there was a feeling that they could accomplish the task at hand. Putting a book into a child’s hand is the first sign that you believe in their greatness. A book is symbolic of all that is possible for them in this world.

Carve Out Time For What You Believe Is Important: The time and attention that you give to the art of reading is what signifies to children its worth and value. If instead of a ball you give a book, our children could predetermine their own destiny. If instead of a concert, we took them to the bookstore our children would not only have a piece of the American pie, but would bake, distribute, and sell the pie.

Interest: Let children read what they enjoy reading. Before we can introduce them to the great pieces of literature, let them read about what interests them. Let them discover, inquire, and revel in the sheer delight of books for both information and pleasure.

Loving Space: When you really think about it, some of your most amazing memories were very simple ones. Mama cooking in the kitchen, conversations outside on the porch with Grandpa… Children find a great deal of pleasure in simply spending time with you. Creating a loving space for just you and your child to dream, believe, and read will be the moments they will talk about the most. These will be the real moments that matter.

Readability level: Make sure that children are reading at their level of comfort. Each page turned should encourage another… Children should have a sense of success when reading and be able to comprehend what they have read.

Talk about books and make it applicable to the real world: One of my favorite books is The Legend of the Valentine. Talk about the challenges and joys we confront as we go through this journey called life. Children love to talk, to share, and to learn. Read to and with your child(-ren). Ask for their opinion about the book. Would they have changed the title? Would they have reacted as the characters did in the book? Would they have written a different ending?

Let them see images that look like them: If you have or work with children of color, let the images they see in books reflect who they are. Let them be proud, hopeful, and secure in their own images. Let them know that the skin they live in is beautiful and adoring.

Have Fun: This is your five minutes of fame! Become the actress or actor you had only dreamed of becoming….Reading to and with your child should be fun. Change your voice as characters are introduced into the story. Sing the song on the page instead of reading it! When describing the place, invoke feelings of wonder, excitement, or doom and gloom if the pages call for it!

In the end, tell your children that reading is a revolutionary act. Tell them that reading defies prejudices and biases. Let your children know that reading is a change agent. Be consistent in your message about reading.

When you really think about it, reading is a constant reminder to our children that we birthed the world, inherited a legacy of great dynasties and great minds, and, every time we pick up a book, our children have an extraordinary opportunity to connect with the greatness that is rightfully theirs.

Thelma Morris-Lindsey is founding director of Earning by Learning of Dallas (EBL), a 13 year old nonprofit created to motivate children to read. EBL is in 64 Dallas ISD elementary schools and currently a part of a Harvard research study. For more information about Earning by Learning, log onto www.eblofdallas.org or www.americaninequalitylab.com or email tlindsey@eblofdallas.org

Earning by Learning • 2904 Floyd Street, Ste. A-1• Dallas, Texas 75241• Phone: 214-442-1620
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This is the first in a series, where we will pose the question to folks in the children’s literature/literacy community: How can you inspire children to read?

Now, I pose the question to you: How do you inspire children to read?

–Don

So many books.  So little time.

 I’m overwhelmed with the sheer number of books available. I used to feel ignorant when someone would wax on about an author I hadn’t heard of, because they’d speak of them as if everyone should know the person.

I no longer feel that way.

There are lots of books out there. Our job here at The Brown Bookshelf is to help bring attention to a very tiny niche of books in that vast sea of literature.

It’s no easy feat. So I got to thinking (always a dangerous thing,  by the way), how does one narrow the field when directing someone to good books?

Hey, I thought, those books were produced by a publisher!  Why not start there?

Although the CCBC’s stats revealed that the number of African American authors producing children’s books actually decreased in 2007 - made my heart ache - information is a dangerous thing.  If you’re looking for children’s books for and/or by African American authors here the following are a few places to begin.

Now, just like it’s tricky to go all “I’d like to thank” on people, because you’ll always leave someone out - I do not claim the list below is comprehensive.  Nor are these the only imprints that print multi-cultural books. But it’s a good starting point.

Jump At the Sun (Hyperion)
Likely one of the most recognized African American children’s publishers, the 10-year-old imprint is home to some of the most well-known African American children’s authors, among them Sharon G. Flake, Kadir Nelson, Andrea Pinkney & Jerry Pinkney, Deborah Gregory (author of The Cheetah Girls) and Christopher Myers. It’s also the publisher of several 28 Days Later spotlight authors including Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu, Valerie Wilson Wesley and illustrator Shane Evans.

Inspired by and named for the advice of author Zora Neale Hurston’s mother, telling her daughter to aim high and jump at the sun, JATS is a leading publisher in the field of African American children’s books, offering both the literary and the popular. If award-winning books are your thing, you’ll find no shortage among JATS’ authors.

Dafina for Young Readers (Kensington)
Kensington Books is the last man standing among independent U.S. publishers of hardcover, mass trade and paperback books. Well-known among romance readers and writers, Kensington’s African American imprint, Dafina, ventured into YA in 2006 to help fill the void in diverse offerings for African American teen readers, with the release of the popular Drama High series.

Though a newcomer to YA, Dafina for Young Readers is fast earning a reputation for hip, contemporary, multi-cultural popular teen literature. The imprint is cultivating a growing stable of authors, among them 28 Days spotlight author, Stephanie Perry Moore, Latino author, Kim Flores and Brown Book shelf co-founder, yours truly, Paula Chase.

Amistad (Harper Collins)
Another long-time player in the African American children’s book publishing game, Amistad is home to 28 Days Later vanguard authors Walter Dean Myers, Rita Williams-Garcia, and Eloise Greenfield as well as hidden gem, Nina Crews.

Although best known for its heavily literay list with name authors like Nikki Grimes and Gwendolyn Brooks, Amistad could rightly be credited with taking the first step in offering middle grade pop fic for African American readers with the ‘05 release of Philana Marie Boles, Little Divas.

Kimani Tru (Harlequin)
Like Dafina for Young Readers, Kimani Tru was born of a traditional romance house. One of the most recognized romance publishers in the U.S. and no doubt internationally, Harlequin joined the YA for AA fray in ‘07 with its first release, Indigo Summer by Monica McKayhan. Since then, you’re likely unable to get out of the YA section without noticing the bold, colorful Kimani Tru label luring your eye to one of their many teen lit books.

Using a balanced mix of fresh new voices - teen writer, Cassandra Carter and JD Guilford- combined with veteran writers taking their first step into young adult fiction (Joyce Davis of Upscale Magazine, Kendra Lee of Heart & Soul) Kimani Tru is becoming a go-to source for readers seeking teen lit with various shades of romance.

Just Us Books
A rare bird in today’s giant publisher-dominated landscape, Just Us Books is an independent black-owned company dedicated to publishing children’s books. Kicked off with the popular AFRO-BETS ABC picture book, Just Us Books is now celebrating its 20th year offering books of interest to people of color. Although they offer all levels of children’s books, picture books are the lion’s share of JUB’s catalog.

Known for agressively pursuing opportunities to showcase their authors, JUB’s focus on children’s books has attracted a wide range of writers - from the award-winning to the debut. Among the authors whose books have found a home at JUB, 28 Days spotlight authors Eleanora E. Tate, Valerie Wilson-Wesley, vanguard, Carole Boston-Weatherford, popular authors Nikki Grimes and Rosa Guy, and Brown Bookshelf member, Kelly Starling Lyons.

When looking for children’s books of African American interest, no better place to start than where the rubber meets the road. Check these publishers and their imprints out for future releases and stay tuned while I dig deep among publishers like Flux and biggie, Random House - those without a special imprint for multi-cultural but who have and are publishing multi-cultural books.

Before John Was a Jazz Giant: A Song of John Coltrane
Written by Carole Boston Weatherford
Illustrated by Sean Qualls
Published by Henry Holt and Company, April 2008

Life can be a rat race, I know. We get so busy we never take the time to stop and listen, taking a chance on missing life’s blessings.

Young John Coltrane, however, didn’t miss his blessings. He listened. He listened to the sounds that ham bones made as they cooked in his Grandma’s pots. He listened to the hiss of steam engines, and to the warbling of birds. He listened to the hymns his mother played on the piano for the church choir. Before John Coltrane became a jazz giant, “he was all ears.”

Written by award-winning author, Carole Boston Weatherford, this picture book biography tunes along like a song. The text is kid-friendly with the young child in mind. It’s easy to read, rhythmic, repetitive. My 6-year-old son could read this book on his own, and fully grasp the story because there’s not a bunch of dates or milestones to remember, things he wouldn’t care about anyway.

Before John Was a Jazz Giant is illustrated by Sean Qualls. And same as his previous books, his artwork pleases. His color pallet and impromptu, painterly style croons. A perfect match for the subject matter.

An author’s note at the end fills in the details.

Other blogs about this book:

A Fuse #8 at School Library Journal

Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast

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I picked up this book last week at the Texas Library Association’s conference in Dallas, Texas. I was pleasantly surprised at the number of publishers who were familiar with The Brown Bookshelf and our 28 Days Later initiative. If you have a picture book that you’d like to submit for possible mention here, send me an email and I’ll return it with my mailing address (For the sake of full disclosure, I may donate books to schools or libraries, but I also reserve the right to keep them, since this is an unpaid, volunteer endeavor). Personally, I don’t like the term book review. There may be some formal protocol that I don’t know about, and so to keep things casual, I will post book reports. Anyone can write an informal book report, right?

What to send:
Picture books or very early chapter books, of particular interest to African American children (regardless of the race of the author). I’m looking for books with African American characters (however you choose to define that) or subject matter.

For other types of books — YA novels, middle grade chapters, graphic novels, contact Paula, Varian, Kelly or Carla (Although they, I’m sure, would welcome picture books too.)

– Don

Children’s librarian and author Vaunda Micheaux Nelson was exploring an exhibit of historic rag dolls at New Mexico’s International Museum of Folk Art when inspiration struck. As she perused the collection, which included a few dolls from Underground Railroad hideouts, she is quoted as thinking: “If only these dolls could talk.”

So began Nelson’s journey to use a doll to give voice to the harsh realities of slavery. Her award-winning picture book, Almost to Freedom, beautifully illustrated by Colin Bootman (Carolrhoda, 2003), does this in a powerful way.

Sally, the doll of enslaved child Lindy, witnesses the hardships of the time — picking cotton in oppressive heat, feeling the pain of the lash, bearing the searing ache of loved ones being sold away. When Lindy and her mom escape for freedom along the Underground Railroad, Sally comes with them.  One night, the family — reunited with Lindy’s father – has to flee a safe house to escape slave catchers and Sally is accidentally left behind. The doll, lonely at first, brings the story full circle as she becomes the fabric of hope for another child.

Almost to Freedom is a rich story. Adapted into a play for St. Paul, Minnesota’s SteppingStone Theater, Nelson’s book continues to move children and adults. Author of several books for young readers, including Juneteenth (Millbrook Press, 2006), Possibles (Putnam, 1997), Beyond Mayfield (Putnam, 1999) and Mayfield Crossing (Putnam, 2002), Nelson’s latest offering is Bad News for Outlaws: The Remarkable Life of Bass Reeves, Deputy U.S. Marshal (Carolrhoda), illustrated by Tyrone Geter. It debuts November 2008.

2004 Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Book

“A compelling story told from the point of view of an enslaved child’s beloved rag doll. Made for young Lindy by her mama, Miz Rachel, the hand-stitched toy is the girl’s most prized possession. She tells her, “Your name be Sally. We gonna be best friends.” When the child’s father is sold and Lindy is beaten for asking Massa’s son how to spell her name, the horrid conditions of the cotton plantation become intolerable. One night Miz Rachel wakes Lindy and they run for their lives. They are reunited with Mr. Henry and the fugitive family heads North to freedom. They are given shelter at a station on the Underground Railroad, but must flee from slave catchers in the middle of the night. In the frantic scramble, Sally is left behind. The doll is lonely for her friend and worries for the safety of Lindy and her folks. When another child and her mother are sheltered in the basement, the doll joins her new best friend on her trip to Freedom. This accessible story is told in language that is within the experience of a young child and makes its impact without frightening or overwhelming readers. It is ultimately a story of hope and resilience, love and friendship. The evocative oil paintings are expertly rendered and effectively convey the powerful emotions of the tale. A fine addition to most collections.”

– School Library Journal

“Lindy’s beloved rag doll, Sally, tells how Lindy’s family escapes on the Underground Railroad to find freedom “in a place called North.” The doll’s narrative and Bootman’s dark, dramatic paintings bring close the child’s daily experience: the cruel separation and physical punishment, and then the adventure of running away and hiding. At times it’s hard to distinguish Sally from Lindy–why not just let the child tell the story herself? But then there’s an anguished twist in the plot: the child and her doll are separated. Lindy gets away, but in the turmoil she leaves her doll behind. When another escaping child finds Sally and hugs her to herself, the story comes full circle. That’s a powerful way to express the sorrow of loving families torn apart, and Bootman’s stirring portraits, many of them set at night, in rich shades of purple and brown, show that the small rag doll bears witness to historical events of cruelty and courage.”

– Booklist

I’m used to my own blog being quiet.  People lurk and like it that way. I never give them a hard time about it.

But Don and I have always wished the comments here at the BBS reflected the number of folks actually visiting.  Still, I don’t want to scare anyone away by making them feel they need to comment.  But I would like you to speak up to Essence Book Editor, Patrik Henry Bass: patrikspicks at esssence dot com.

In the latest issue of Essence, he’s reviewed two children’s books -We Are The Ship by Kadir Nelson and Hotlanta, the new YA series by Denene Millner and Mitzi Miller.  This is a great start, as Essence doesn’t review children’s lit with any regularity.

Now, it just so happens that We Are The Ship and Hotlanta are already hot literary commodities.  So as excited as I am to see them given some shine, I’m more excited that Mr. Bass has asked readers to submit, to him, their favorite African American children’s book titles.

Here’s your chance to let the book editor of an African American lifestyle media mainstay know what you - librarians, teachers, parents and other influencers - are reading or recommending to young readers of color.

The number of children’s titles by authors of color was down in 2007. But that doesn’t mean we can’t pay homage to the authors who wrote some great literature for young readers by making Essence and Mr. Bass aware of them.

What I’m saying is - you don’t have to out yourself in the comments below, but drop Essence a line and let them know what your favorite African American children’s book is - be it one of our jewels (the vets) or hidden gems (newbies and midlisters).

Speak up for your fave.